I was reading about India and Scotch — not the kind you sip while watching monsoon rain in Goa, but the kind that moves in tanker trucks and steel drums. The Indian government has signaled it will apply the recently agreed UK-India tariff reduction to bulk Scotch, not just bottled whisky.
That matters because most Scotch shipped to India isn’t bottled there — it’s blended, diluted, sometimes even re-distilled locally before hitting shelves. Lower tariffs on bulk imports could shift margins, timing, and who controls the final product.
I remember bottling a batch in Bangalore in ’09 — three weeks, two broken pumps, and a man named Rajiv who swore by turmeric in his Old Fashioned. Nothing’s changed much, except now the paperwork might be lighter. And the Scotch, if you’re lucky, a little less expensive.
